Curious what others think: how should a writer pronoun a character who is a trans egg when writing in third person?
I don't think there's any one hard and fast rule to this by any means, but I'm curious what thoughts people have and what different approaches they've seen in fiction.
I do have some reference points that take different approaches, like Binnie's "Nevada" and Peters' "Detransition, Baby." But thinking about a character I'm writing, and not sure what seems like the right approach.
if third person limited (in their head but still using third person), use what they use for themselves. this packs a huge emotional whallop when it flips and even when it wavers.
in third person omniscient, their authentic gender. possibly build in an aside in the narrator's voice explaining whats happening
@JoscelynTransient I'd probably go with they/them.
@JoscelynTransient It depends on what effect you're going for or what point you're trying to make.
If the goal is to emphasize their self-denial or to obfuscate this information from the audience, I would use their assigned gender or perhaps the neutral "they." But I can certainly see reasons to use their real pronouns even and especially if it creates dissonance, to shed light on what's really happening.
@JoscelynTransient Makes sense to follow the pronouns they use at the point in the story? I guess depends on the story, whether you plan on doing a reveal of some sort, how much time travel is involved, etc.
@JoscelynTransient i think that though id be writing third person, the choices on the pronouns i'd make would reflect how the character felt about themselves in the moment.
i know we love to say we dont misgender ourselves but we totally do, in our heads, or out loud, as a self flagelation thing. i think i wouldnt be able to resist having a reveal like that where when the character is in their worst low, theyre thinking of themselves in the most painful way they know how.
@JoscelynTransient In the past I’ve seen writers change the pronouns they use for a character after a moment of epiphany. A lot depends on what the tone of your authorial voice is and how you want the reader to perceive the character.
@JoscelynTransient frankly if I was writing a trans story.
And not like a fantasy or a sci-fi story like a serious trans story
I would have her aggressively misgender herself in her head at all times.
And then for a secondary point of view I would have the people around her just be like yeah this is obviously a girl I don't know what she's talking about.
@JoscelynTransient let's not ask me why I would do this lol
@JoscelynTransient@chaosfem.tw it probably depends on the audience. One of my kid's books (Backwards Day by S. Bear Bergman) is about a trans boy, and uses she/her right up until he realizes he's a boy, then immediately switches to he/him, and I think it is done well, with the intention of it being easy for kids to understand.
@JoscelynTransient One of my favorite middle grade books is called Melissa, about a trans girl. It was originally released with the title George, but the author changed it for subsequent printings. It uses she/her pronouns throughout. It uses George to refer to her until toward the end of the book when a friend loans her clothes and she looks in the mirror, at which point it switches to Melissa mid paragraph (which you know from the beginning is her secret name).
I thought, especially for a kids book, the juxtaposition of she/her pronouns against the George name really illustrated how jarring it is.
@JoscelynTransient maybe try to avoid pronouns entirely and just use name.
Jul 30, 2026, 7:44 AM@thesquirrelfish @JoscelynTransient
That... doesn't really change much. I mean the name and pronouns should probably change together, so that just makes the question "which name".
@leeloo @JoscelynTransient maybe. I'm seeing more & more young people keeping their birth name while going public with their authentic gender.